How we rate UK casinos: the formula in full

The order of the table comes from a formula, and the formula is printed here. That is unusual, and it is only possible because every input is a public regulatory fact.

The three inputs

Licence tenure. How long has the casino licence been held, measured from the start date in the register, capped at twelve years.

Direct or white label. Does the operator hold its own licence, or trade on someone else’s? A white label is lawful and common, but it means the regulated party is not the brand a player deals with — and that is who a complaint eventually reaches.

Estate breadth. How many active licensed domains sit under the same account? An operator with a large licensed portfolio has more at risk from a compliance failure than one with a single site.

The formula

score = 0.5 baseline
      + tenure in years / 12 × 2.5     (max 2.5)
      + 1.0  if the licence is held directly, 0 for a white label
      + active domains / 25 × 1.0      (max 1.0)
      capped at 5.0

Worked example: an operator licensed since November 2014 (11.7 years), holding its licence directly, with 39 active domains, scores 0.5 + 2.44 + 1.0 + 1.0 = 4.94, rounded to 4.9.

What tenure does and does not mean

A large number of operators show 1 November 2014. That is the day remote licensing came into force under the Gambling (Licensing and Advertising) Act 2014, not a founding date — anyone licensed that day was already trading beforehand under other arrangements.

So the figure measures documented time under the current regime. It is the best available proxy for a compliance record, and it is not a measure of how old the company is.

What is deliberately excluded

Game selection. Same suppliers, same stake cap, same wagering cap. It does not distinguish.

Bonuses. They change weekly, and the wagering requirement is capped at 10x for everyone.

Design. Not measurable. Anyone scoring it is scoring their own taste.

Payout speed in hours. It depends on payment method, verification status and timing. An average would be invented.

The obvious objection

This site earns commission from listed operators, which raises the fair question of whether the order is for sale.

The answer is structural rather than a promise. Every input is a figure published by the Commission. There is no term in the formula that anyone here can adjust without it being visible to anyone who re-runs the arithmetic — which is why the weights are printed above instead of a general assurance of independence.

Worked examples from the current table

Two entries show the formula’s shape more clearly than the definition does. PlayOJO scores at the top: a licence held since the first day of the remote regime, held directly, and an account carrying thirty-nine active domains. Every one of the three inputs is at or near its maximum.

MrQ sits at the other end with a licence dating to late 2023, held directly, on a single-domain account. The direct-licence component is identical to PlayOJO’s; tenure and breadth are not. The gap between the two scores is therefore almost entirely a statement about time, which is exactly what it should be — and exactly why a low score here is not an accusation.

What would change a score

Three things, and only three. A licence passing another anniversary raises tenure. An operator moving from a white-label arrangement to its own licence changes the second input. Domains being added to or removed from the account changes the third. Nothing an operator says, pays or offers moves any of them.

A licence surrendered or revoked removes the operator from the table entirely rather than lowering its score, because the table lists licensed operators and an unlicensed one has no place in it.